The Keeper
by Belladonna1185
Summary: Can memories be enough to sustain a man? Snarry


**A/N: I wrote this little diddy after I read this AMAZING Snarry story series called If You Are Prepared by Cybele last week on Walking the Plank and I literally couldn't get it out of my head for days. Prob. one of the best Snarry's I've ever read. Check it out if you haven't read it. It's novel length, but so very good.**

**~Belladonna~**

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><p><strong>The Keeper<strong>

_He remembered the gentle press of their lips. How they molded perfectly together, the thrilling sighs he could provoke with teeth and tongue. The sweet ache he felt every time they kissed. The surrender to it all._

_All gone._

_He remembered the fights, the lovers spats, the heated arguments, the major rifts that always brought them back together stronger than before. The pain only temporary, only fleeting- stolen moments. Wasted time._

_All gone._

_He remembered the feel of his head on his shoulder. Raven locks that smelled of grass and light and sun. Like home. The lazy days spent by the fire, by the lake, in the bed. Laughter freely given._

_All gone._

_He remembered the first time, the last time they were together. The brilliance, the ecstasy of their puzzle-piece bodies joined together to make the whole. The way they moved in concert. The sweet moans, the tears of joy, nothing could compare. His desperate cries. Their declarations of love eternal, everlasting, infinite. _

_All gone. _

_He tried to hold on to the phantom warmth of his arms, his legs. His radiant green eyes that had pierced his soul, held him, broke him open. He tried to remember that for one shining moment in time he had finally found the love he had desperately searched for, had longed for. For one incandescent fraction of life he had been truly, blissfully happy. _

_All gone._

_He tried to remember that it had been fates decree; that this was the task his love had been born for. That he, himself, had worked and sacrificed and bleed twenty and more years for. That this was righteous. That the light had prevailed. That all was right in the world._

_But it's not._

_No. It never would. It never could. He was gone. It was beyond cruel, beyond excruciating, beyond unbearable to finally see the sun, to touch the sky for the first time only to be thrust back unto darkness. To be alone once more._

_Alone. All Alone._

_Yes. He was alone. Alone to remember. To be the keeper of dreams lost and hopes found. The keeper of moments both tender and harsh. To walk the halls where his love once walked and honor the path he took. To pretend to the world that his love's death meant nothing more than a former student's passing. To suffer fools exclamations on things they knew not. How his love was a great person, how his sacrifice was noble, how honored the world should be that his love had died for them. _

_While yes, it was all true that they should feel honored, be grateful that they were not forced to forfeit one-hundred years of happiness on the altar of martyrdom, it did not mean they had the right to speak as if they knew his love. They never did. They never wanted to. They were content to remember the icon, the false idol of their own creation. Not the beautiful, fragile spirit that lay within the frame of one so young. Of one so full of life. One that had dreams aspirations never allowed to been given voice. One that had cried and trembled and longed for another life yet walked to his death with head held high. Only he knew. Only him and now he was left to be keeper of the flame. _

_Hands, eyes, heart, legs, smile, all gone. Laughter, tears, arms, all gone. _

_All gone._

_He took a breath as the sorrow, black and heavy, engulfed him like the evening tide._

"_Severus, you will come to the funeral. You will be there."_

"_No."_

_Hands grab him. Hold him. Trap him. He can't bear it; they aren't his loves hands. His loves hands are cold, are ash, are forever still._

"_You need to be there to pay your respects to the boy. I know you hated h-"_

"_You know nothing. You presume to know what resides in my heart, my mind, my soul? The barer of that knowledge is now dead and gone from my reach. I will not go and see the face of the one I held more precious than breath gone pale and lifeless. I will remember him as he is in my mind, in my heart. You know nothing. Nothing. I am the keeper of his heart as he was the keeper of mine."_

_He turned and left, down to the dungeons, once full of life, now like a tomb. He didn't care what she thought of his words. He wanted to drown, to fade like the fae of old, to dissolve into the night, to be with his love, but he knows he has to go on… for he loved him._

_Loves him._

_Who else would be the vessel of Harry's memories, his love, his life?_

_It is his job to love him. _

_It is the only thing that kept it from being all so meaningless._

_He remembered…_


End file.
